Abstract
There has been much controversy about the mathematics results of the 2008 National Senior Certificate examinations – the first to be written by pupils following the outcomes-based curriculum. This article examines the impact of the new high school mathematics curriculum on the performance in physics by first-year Engineering students at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. The first-year physics results of the Engineering students who wrote the 2008 National Senior Certificate (NSC) examinations were compared with the physics results of the Engineering students of the previous 4 years who wrote the Senior Certificate Examinations (SCE). Analysis of variance was used to compare the average physics marks of the NSC and SCE groups. Correlation analysis was performed to determine the relationship between performance in high school mathematics with performance in first-year physics in Engineering for both the 2008 NSC group and the 2007 SCE group. The results showed a lower physics pass rate for the NSC students compared with that of the SCE students. There was also a significant difference in the average marks obtained in physics between the NSC students and the SCE students. The new high school mathematics curriculum has fallen short in providing essential skills and techniques for students who wish to study physics at university. Furthermore, the high school mathematics results of the NSC students are an indication of considerable grade inflation.
Highlights
Prior to 2008, the Senior Certificate Examination (SCE) was the culmination of South African high school education, the results of which were used for entrance into tertiary institutions
In the 4-year period studied, our results show that the pass rate for PHYS151 prior to 2009 averaged 67%, with the average mark being fairly consistent
In 2009 – the first year to be undertaken by students who wrote the new National Senior Certificate (NSC) examination – there was a dramatic decrease in both the pass rate and the average module mark for PHYS151
Summary
Prior to 2008, the Senior Certificate Examination (SCE) was the culmination of South African high school education, the results of which were used for entrance into tertiary institutions. In 1998, a new outcomes-based curriculum was introduced and the first National Senior Certificate (NSC) examination set on this curriculum was written in 2008. A major concern amongst tertiary educators in the mathematics and science fields has been the relegation of Euclidean geometry to an optional section of the NSC mathematics syllabus. A newspaper article titled ‘New maths curriculum does not add up’[1] laments the fact that the new mathematics curriculum denies pupils a satisfactory grounding to enable them to pursue post-matriculation studies in mathematics-dominated degrees such as Engineering and Natural Sciences. Smetherham[3], in a newspaper article titled ‘Varsity students lack essential skills’, mentions that of the students who wrote the mathematics tests of the National Benchmarks Tests Project in February 2009, only 7% were found to be academically proficient
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